I just finished up with an appointment with a career advisor and even more confused now.

Im a nurse and i work in aged care. I went into nursing because i wanted to be a midwife. I started midwifery last year and the demands of the course are extreme. You have placement, classes, continuity of care women to follow and more. They warned us its like having a full time job but i thought i have the determination to get it done. But trying to work while study and keep up with those study commitments, be a single mum, its impossible to do. And now im almost tempted to drop out.

Another option is family/child community health. Its an extension of nursing, no shift work, still get to work with the women, babies, families which is similar to the midwifery. Ive done 2 placements in child/family health and loved it. Love it even more than the placements ive had in postnatal and birthing unit.

Having that appointment with the careers advisor just left me questioning so much. Do i go into community? Do i keep going with midwifery? Do i find a different career completely?

I did the job outlook quiz and its all mixed! 40% administration, 20% enterprise, 20% helping, 6% analytical, 6% creative. Plus doing the quiz and the results really depends on my mood. The results are never the same.

I just dont know what i want to do as a career. I hooked on to being a midwife for 10 years because i loved being pregnant and guess i wanted to share that experience with other women by helping them?

When i think of other careers i just think of the worst. That i wont be good at it, i wont enjoy it, ill mess up massively, ill make a fool of myself.

I just want something ill enjoy that doesnt cause too much stress and has a decent pay.

I love gaming but not like i could be a professional gamer. I love to dance and sing but way too old to do that now. Love learning piano but no way id ever get good enough at play it to make a career out of it. I love travelling but cant really do that as a single mum. I love photography but thats too expensive.

Hate this!!

Hi MissJ94,

Thank you for sharing this with us. There's a great irony in seeing a careers advisor giving you advice and still not knowing what to do.

I haven't worked as a nurse but I've done a lot of admin/support work and I can see the significant differences between hospital work and community work. Both work with beautiful babies, both support parents, but your day to day is so different.

It sounds like you are putting so much pressure on yourself to get this absolutely right. But I've been learning through my own searches that I don't think there is a perfect answer or a perfect path to go down. One of my managers/supervisors told me that 'the worst decision is indecision', which I'm totally guilty of right now!

What would it be like to go for a community job?

I'm not saying that this is what you should do, but I think it's so important to remind yourself that it's okay to not have all the answers. You're also not deciding for 'life' - you're deciding for 'now' which means you can go back to midwifery, or you can decide to follow the side passions.

I'll stop now otherwise I'll start listing photographers who just use their phones, or travellers who are single mums, or 'old' dancers and singers, or gamers who start on Twitch.

I trust you and the decision that you'll make.

rt :)

Hi MissJ94. I know the midwifery course you are talking about and it is a hard, hard slog. How much longer have you got to go of your course? Have you talked to your educator about it? All I can say is you must be pretty high achieving because it is quite competitive to get into, but yes it would be really hard to manage as a single parent.

I think you need to consider what is most important to you at the moment, and remember that what is best for you right now is going to change when your child(ren) are older/more independent. There are so many options available to you in nursing that there is almost always something to suit everyone's lifestyle, and if shiftwork does not fit in with what you want for your family right now, maybe community nursing is the right choice. Especially if you say you loved the placements you had there.

There is no shame in putting your course on pause, and working in family/community nursing will actually set you up really well for the midwifery course if you wanted to return to it further down the track. Another option is to go into an administrative based nursing role, eg a staffing role where you're sourcing staff for shift vacancies, looking for roles that work on projects, or research-based roles.

Wish you the best with your decision.